Losses triple at Goodwin’s polyimide business as production issue bites
Losses at Goodwin’s polyimide business Duvelco nearly tripled to £1.7m in the four months to 31 August.
It comes as the Stoke-on-Trent engineering group moves toward completing its £1.1bn sale of a substantial part of its Mechanical Engineering Division to US investment firm Cerberus Capital Management, one of the largest deals to come out of Staffordshire in recent years. The sale was agreed in September, with completion expected in the first quarter of 2027.
The loss was up from £592,000 the previous year. It followed a mechanical issue during commissioning of Duvelco’s full-scale production plant, which has left the final drying stage constraining output to around 20% of designed capacity.
The lead time for a replacement dryer is currently estimated at around 10 months, though the team is pursuing ways to shorten this. Trials with alternative dryers are also under way. Due to the proposed disposal, the group will relocate polyimide presses originally intended for Noreva in Germany to a UK site near Duvelco’s Stoke-on-Trent plant.
Elsewhere, the businesses set to remain within the group after the sale showed a stronger performance. Profits from Goodwin’s overseas refractory businesses rose 19% year-on-year to £3.1m. UK powder operations were affected by planned maintenance at Hoben International, where the calciner was taken offline for around 11 weeks, alongside elevated gold and silver prices weighing on demand at Goodwin Refractory Services.
AVD Fire, the group’s lithium-ion battery fire protection business, and Dupré Minerals made a strong start to the year. Combined profits rose 30% to £1.0m.
Completion of the Mechanical Engineering disposal is expected in the first quarter of 2027, subject to regulatory approval. It covers Goodwin Steel Castings, Goodwin International, Noreva, Easat Group and the Pumps Division. The Goodwin Engineering Training School will transfer with the business being sold, reflecting that the majority of its apprentices progress into those operations.
The group expects no UK corporation tax to be payable on the gain from the disposal. The board is still considering how to return a significant proportion of the net cash proceeds to shareholders, with no final decision yet made on amount, timing or form. A recruitment process has also begun for a chief executive and finance director to lead the continuing businesses once the sale completes.
